An IVF procedure has five main steps. First, we’re increasing your egg supply. Women undergo an injection that stimulates the ovaries to produce more eggs than the usual natural cycle. The second step is to monitor your progress and mature the oocytes. An ultrasound is done to check the development of the eggs, and medications are used to help them mature.

Once the follicles reach a mature size of 17 or 18 mm, an injection of HCG is administered, which leads to the final development and maturation of the eggs. The third step is to collect the eggs from the ovaries. This procedure is performed using ultrasound guidance, where the doctor uses a narrow needle to retrieve the eggs from the ovary through the vaginal wall. The procedure is painless, performed under light anesthesia. The fourth step of IVF treatment is to fertilize the eggs in the laboratory. Sperm can either be mixed with eggs to fertilize (this is called conventional insemination – standard IVF procedure), or selected sperm can be injected directly into each mature egg (this is called intracytoplasmic sperm injection or ICSI).

Fertilized eggs, now called embryos, are allowed to grow and develop in culture media for typically 3 or 5 days. When they reach 5 days, they are called blastocyst stage embryos. Then usually 1 or 2 embryos, which have demonstrated the best quality and development, are carefully transferred to the uterus. A small, sterile, flexible catheter for embryo transfer is used for this purpose. This is the most important step in an IVF procedure. After the embryos are transferred to your uterus, you should wait 2 weeks before taking a pregnancy test to see if the treatment worked or not.